


No Plan Survives Contact With The Enemy

by kyanve



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-09
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-10-01 11:14:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10188710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyanve/pseuds/kyanve
Summary: Pre-Cartenau, Thancred has a bit of an intel run to the other side of the wall that goes completely pear-shaped and turns into a "We Never Speak Of This Again" incident for both him and the Garleans.





	

Infiltration runs were one of those wonderful types of jobs that was 60% crushing menial boredom and praying that nothing continued to happen interspersed with 30% stretches of cataloguing information on horrible things for later use while being unable to actually do anything and praying the squad you were infiltrating wasn’t one of the ones getting the order themselves, and 10% moments of testing how well you could have moments of screaming panic while acting perfectly normal. 

Mopping the landing outside one of the Magitek bays was solidly in that larger 60%. 

The sound of the Centurion that was overseeing snapping to attention nudged it towards the edge of that, the practiced act of forming the line as if it were an automatic action with the other four or halfway through when he saw what higher officer had caused it and the situation decided to toe the edge of that last 10%. 

Bloody Nero and his bloody “surprise inspections” playing rat-catcher. 

“Merely checking by for an inspection; it is all the more important to maintain ourselves this close to the front.” He gave the Centurion a back-handed wave; the Centurion dropped salute, staying at still attention. Thancred and the rest of the squad held the salute, even if that did mean he was holding the mop at an attention more appropriate to a spear. 

The red armor passed by, studying each of them…

And then casually passed back to him.

He didn’t move, expression a tense schooled-military neutral, but was mentally stringing together a test of the extent of his vocabulary of multilingual curse words. 

“Name and rank, soldier?” The Tribunus was still keeping an easy, relaxed stance and voice, rote routine and leaving it to rank and proximity to serve as an implied threat. 

“Oswin Browne, Sir, Hoplomachi Second Class, Fifth Squad, Fourteenth Cohort.” It rolled off with a fast, clipped, reflex cadence, a rote recitation, nothing out of place in posture next to the others.

“And your current mission?” The bored tone was another one of the tests, but at least meant he hadn’t slipped yet. 

“Outer security detail while the Legatus is on the front, Sir.” That one was almost a basic competence test for short-run infiltration, the few that got caught there were people who never should’ve been attempting an infiltration mission to begin with.

“The mission before that?” Same bored tone, but there was a hair of the Centurion stiffening slightly, one of the other three similarly tensing at attention; you could tell who’d been around when he’d caught a spy before to know the implication of the Tribunus himself asking basic questions. 

“Patrol duty along the internal perimeter of the wall, sir, in case of potential incursions from the Eorzeans.” 

Nero nodded faintly, and turned, starting to walk away towards the end of the line.

And then stopped, and a half-second later there was a sword leveled at him; he managed to mostly hold attention, leaning back a couple inches in surprise, one foot moving back to step away and then back to attention, while the rest of the line flinched, staying at attention on reflex and training.

“That accent. Where are you from?”

Godsdamnit, he had slipped hadn’t he; he gave a mental prayer to every one of the Twelve in turn that Nero was doing ambient inspections and hadn’t been going over specific manifests before coming out. “S-severn’s Field, sir - one of the first out.” He was very aware of where each of his knives was, and that he was playing a very small game of who’s-reflexes-are-faster chicken potentially where breaking attention in case he needed to move would’ve been the death of him.

There was a pause, a faint incline of the helmet, a few long seconds; at least it meant random ambient inspections, he was pretty sure the one he’d replaced was from somewhere in Ilsabard, and if Nero’d been looking over manifests individually before hand, he would’ve already struck, but if he’d gone with the man’s actual background, Nero would’ve known the slip was the wrong accent even if he hadn’t checked the manifests.

“Sharlayan?” It sounded faintly boggled; he knew there were a few that’d been folded into the XIVth, stragglers that had chosen not to be evacuated for one reason or another that failed to get out of the area fast enough when the Empire moved to attack, but it was still in the window where most of the few taken that would’ve been young enough to raise to it weren’t old enough yet, and there were only a few of the outlying villages that might’ve been pulled out early enough and had surrendered fast enough to be allowed into the military without a good bit of “processing”. “There weren’t many of your people that handled things reasonably.” He was a perfectly loyal survivor of a now-dead city that had accepted his new role and was mostly leaning on reflexive protocol to avoid the otherwise appropriate reaction to having the point of a Tribunus’s sword an inch from his nose, completely, there was absolutely no storm of mental swearing and homicidal thoughts going on at all. “And fewer that were potential military material.” 

Not a bit of thought of various horrible maiming deaths and entrails strung from trees because of being too aware of what happened to some of the survivors, not at all. “We had wolves and the occasional drake or giant to contend with…” He gave the point of the sword a brief, nervous glance, not breaking the salute and attention.

There was a long, still pause where Nero was studying him, the point of the sword faintly ticking up in a gesture of reminder that attention included focusing on the officer; he wasn’t sure if a lack of the ornate helm to see expression would’ve helped him read how badly it was still reflex-chicken or not. 

The sword turned faintly, then withdrew, Nero resheathing it. “As you were.” 

The salutes dropped, but nobody broke attention until after he was out of sight, including the Centurion. 

They’d been mercifully close to wrapping up, and the Centurion hurried it so that they were sent to pack things up and otherwise be dismissed in a couple minutes; he was pretty sure the Centurion’s nerves were shot enough to contribute to that one.

It meant he had time to ditch the uniform and slip off while nobody was looking, through a loosened panel into part of the inner workings of the wall of the central structure that shouldn’t have been accessible at all; just enough freedom of moment to retreat to the hide-hole he’d already prepared just under the vent system by the command room. 

Sure enough, a minute later there was the sound of the door sliding open and shut, metal footsteps fast enough to signal some irritation crossing the room, cabinets sliding open, and papers rustling.

And then some very vile cursing in Garlean.

The very faint click-chirp of the device in Nero’s armor clicking online for the comm system. “Centurion. The man I questioned. Can you see him right now? ……..Do you know where he is? …..Find him and detain him, now.” A couple footsteps, something clicking, and the sound of sirens and alarms, then another click-chirp. “All units, high alert - I want every one of you to line up and check your squad against personnel manifests, then lock down every way in and out of the base, I don’t care if only a bird could get through; we have an intruder infiltrating our ranks.” 

The faint click of it shutting off, and a few more metal clicks of Nero pacing, another click, and the metal clank of something being set down; when he spoke again, Nero’s voice wasn’t filtered. through the helmet.

“….Shall I go bad news good news?” It was curt, angry, and agitated, but Nero was trying to rein it in respectful, which meant one person, and likely that one being the only other person in the room; the response must not’ve been anything said out loud. “First bad news, the Eorzeans have found a way to fake eye color; if he’d had brown eyes like the last close call he pulled off, I would have had him.” Nero was snarling, he could about mentally fill in the agitated hand gestures in with the sound of pacing, and he made a tiny mental note to do something INCREDIBLY nice for the Ashcrown Consortium sylphs and letting him test out their new glamour toys. “The good news is that unless he simply flubbed which direction he was faking, or was trying to pick something I’d be less likely to easily identify, I might have a nationality on our feathered pest.” There was enough distaste and agitation on the last two words for him to be pretty sure Nero would’ve happily gutted him if Nero’d known he was listening, but the reference to the "Magpie" nickname the Ala Mhigan resistance had given him was unnerving.

“And?” There was just enough resigned irritation in Gaius’s voice, even with the helm’s distortions, to be slightly comforting. 

“He claimed his accent was Sharlayan. I want to check that, if we have one of them around, although it will still leave the possibility he’d fabricated a cover identity using it.” 

“That can be arranged.” He had a small pang of guilt for whoever was going to get interrogated just for the sake of checking how an accent sounded, but at least it was Nero and not Livia. “Are the sweepers operational?” 

“Already deployed. There shouldn’t be a cranny in any duct, chute, transportation lift, or storage unit uncovered.” 

Nero sounded grimly smug, and he was very glad his hiding space was none of the above; he didn’t particularly want to find out what was meant by ‘sweepers’. 

There was movement, more weight to the sound than Nero’s armor. “I have a few checks of my own to make; I believe I will give the perimeter a round personally afterwards. I trust you will keep me informed of any reports?” 

There was a brief shifting sound of Nero holding attention. “Of course, Legatus.” 

Gaius’s heavier footsteps, the door opening and closing, then a shifting sound - Nero taking the chair by the console for the communication system. 

There was a good hour passed; the active alarms died down, but from periodic call-ins, patrol reports, and other things he was overhearing, they were still in a high-alert search pattern and VERY agitated. Nero was getting increasingly sulk-grumbly with each report that came up blank. He was taking some of it as cover to carefully get a few other things in place; cloth pulled up and tied off as a face mask, a pair of tinted goggles, a scarf around his head, a hood secured enough that it would be further obscuring without obstructing movement. 

And then there was the sound of quiet little metallic movement in the vent-duct above him; something with a lot of small legs. 

And it stopped not far from where he was. 

There was a quiet, curious “Hmm?” from Nero; whatever was in the ducts wasn’t moving. “…What on-?” A long, quiet pause, and he was silently shifting to clip the small knapsack with his supplies in place on a couple points on his vest in case he needed to start vacating the area fast. “That can’t be right…” Shifting, a brief scrape, a click, silence; when Nero spoke again the distortion from his helm was back in place, voice dropped quiet. “…Oh you clever bastard.”

He knew from some other things Nero had said in the past that the helm had a very sensitive aetherometer that could be used in short bursts, and apparently, the “sweepers” were also outfitted. 

And from some incidents back in the college, he knew that a sensitive enough one would notice the aura of a person.

That was time to clear out, thank everything that the access-point he’d managed to jury-rig was in an out-of-sight corner out of the way, and bolt; the high-alert alarms were going off again, he was sure Nero was giving chase, and he could hear the clattering of the sweeper in the ducts also pursuing. 

The cover on the duct vent above where he’d been hiding had slid open automatically; the “sweeper” was something spiderlike, unfolding in the space to something about three feet across, the legs looked sharpened, and it looked like there were exposed mechanisms on several parts of the body - not entirely completed, even though it looked VERY Allagan. He slipped under it as it tried to drop on him; without the armor plating protecting its internal parts, it went down easily enough to a thrown knife. He didn’t slow down. 

Two more caught up before anything human; he wasn’t sure if that was all there were, or if they just stopped coming after those two went down. It didn’t really matter, Nero was catching up around the building to the right, and there were two squads closing in, one on either side, clearly angling to stop him before he reached the wall. 

He cut towards one of them, a shoulder-check into the man’s stomach with a blade that worked to put him out of combat and get him to drop his shield where Thancred could grab it on the run. The second closest got the shield square in the chest with his weight behind it and a straight thrust; he knew there was blood, he didn’t care how square it hit down the center line besides that it was another one not chasing him. The third got the shield thrown, catching them under the chin.

That left enough of a clear stretch to get to the wall before Nero or the other four could catch up to the dividing wall; Nero was between him and the door, which was probably locked anyway; he didn’t even bother trying to break that way, catching the top of the wall with one hand at a jump and vaulting over to a few disbelieving stares from the ground. The neighboring area was a narrow space mostly filled with storage containers - and at least five of the spiders that he could see, plus the sound of several others. Of course, the door opened and closed again with a lock-click behind Nero. Whatever the man was doing with his gauntlet, Thancred didn’t want to stick around to find out; he briefly regretted throwing away the shield, clicking the hidden compartment with his second blade. 

Getting through the spiders to the further wall was a little slower going, but still very much a running fight; he knew he took a few of them out, if any of them tagged him it wasn’t anything serious, but he stopped at the wall with the realization that he’d briefly lost track of Nero and that the wall there was just slightly too high to repeat his earlier trick. He was shifting weight in the brief, crouched pause to make for the storage containers - those he could get up and go over that way - when the door in the next wall slid open, and he realized Nero had been by it, but hanging back for something.

Whatever it was, it was floating, moved a little too fast, and looked like a large clawed hand with some kind of half-naked mess of sensor and lights in the center of the palm - big enough to close the claws around anything short of a broad-built Roegadyn. Nero was running to get between him and the storage crates, blocking him in so it could catch him.

It also looked like modified Allagan being rebuilt, and he was beginning to develop a shred of personal loathing for Nero.

He didn’t bother with the crates, instead charging it, grabbing one of its claws as it lunged, and using it and his own momentum to get up onto the back of it, from it to a grip on a light fixture close to the top of the wall, and from there to the top of the wall itself and over, rolling with the impact on the other side. 

It was a landing strip. He bolted for one of the smaller drone/sentry airships, flattening up in part of the undercarriage out of sight; the Magitek engine would give off enough of an Aetheric signature that it’d hopefully be enough noise to mask his presence. 

The door slid shut, he heard Nero passing by, stopping in the middle of the landing strip, and shifting, doubtless scanning the area; there were other footsteps, several normal sets of boots, a couple armored-lighter, and one heavier-sounding but perfectly swift.

So two full squads, a couple Centurions or higher, and Gaius.

“He can’t have made it to the outer wall, he’s still somewhere here.” There was a small noise of frustration, and he pulled a little closer to the drone’s engine, praying they’d send it aloft to look. “The damned bird hides and moves like a Doman, fights like an Ul’dahn in the open, a Limsan cornered, and something is off about his aether.” There was an expectant pause; he wasn’t going to ask when they’d encountered one of the fraternity, he’d have been more surprised if they hadn’t done some recon themselves. “….I can’t make out a damn thing around these drones; he must be using one of them for cover.” 

The footsteps were quieter, the troops trying to move more silently on some signal and spreading out; he could faintly hear Gaius moving as well, measured steps towards his side of the landing field, Nero heading the other way. 

He could see part of the workings, and it was one of the more Allagan based ones with fewer Garlean modifications - which led to a tiny, crazy little desperate idea, flicking one of his smaller knives out and wedging around the plating to the access panel.

It bucked skyward before Gaius could get close enough to examine it, registering very quickly as possibly not his brightest idea, but at least the dark clothing he was wearing probably blended in well with the mostly black plating so he wasn’t as clear of a target where he was crammed into the undercarriage. He hadn’t ever seen one of them move that fast, and he was pretty sure he’d just full-throttled the engine overshooting what the control mechanisms could direct; it didn’t so much fly cleanly over the wall as do some sort of absurd shot over while he tried to figure out how to direct what it was doing, but it was a very nice, very fast arc where he didn’t get it NOT shrieking out at top speed until it was a couple malms away from the base, with him very thankful for where he’d curled up in the undercarriage since it meant not getting the brunt of the wind force directly. 

It seemed to slow and stabilize, tipped, and then the engine died. 

The very brief prayer to Oschon or Llymlaen or maybe Garuda if she was bored enough may have come out in a whimper, he wasn’t sure; he couldn’t really hear himself as the drone decided to drop out of the sky, spiraling out of control badly enough that all he could do was cling in his cranny and pray. Althyk and Nophica not wanting him splattered over their landscape was a safe plea too. 

He knew it’d impacted upside down because after the impact shock, he was intact, not ground into the bottom of it by the rock and earth it’d just made a small crater in, and the sky was above. That was enough for a quick thank you to everything he’d just prayed to, including the Primal, and taking the chance and the mostly intact and functioning state of his limbs to bolt; his ears were ringing and he wasn’t sure he could hear very well at the moment, but that was secondary to getting as far from the wreckage as possible and vanishing before the Empire could get to it to start tracking him. At least the area was mercifully rocky, spotted with some weathered trees; some cover, rolling hills where he could break line of sight, not much in the terrain to leave a trail.


End file.
